Method, base station, terminal and communication system for selecting a component carrier

ABSTRACT

A method, base station, terminal and communication system for selecting a component carrier are provided in the present invention. The method includes the following steps: determining the coverage range of each available carrier which can be used by the terminal; determining whether the distribution of the coverage ranges of all available carriers accords with a preset distribution mode; in the case of according with the presetting distribution mode, at least according to a rule which is determined by the distribution mode, determining a component carrier to be used. With the embodiments provided in the invention, a component carrier used by the terminal can be reasonably chosen.

CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

The present application is a continuation of U.S. application Ser. No.13/639,368, filed on Oct. 4, 2012, issued as U.S. Pat. No. 8,792,381,which is a National Stage of International Application No.PCT/CN2011/072406, filed on Apr. 2, 2011, which claims priority toChinese Application No. 201010162530.8, filed on Apr. 30, 2010. Theabove-noted documents are hereby incorporated by reference in theirentirety.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present application generally relates to the field of wirelesscommunication, and in particular to the field of carrier aggregationcommunication. More particularly, the present application relates to amethod for selecting a component carrier and a method for updating acomponent carrier in a carrier aggregating communication network. Thepresent application further relates to a device for implementing theabove method, including a base station, a terminal, and a communicationsystem including the base station and the terminal.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

Future LTE-A (Long Term Evolution-Advanced) system will support atransmission bandwidth up to 100 MHz. However, the maximum supportabletransmission bandwidth in LET (Long Term Evolution) standard is 20 MHz,and thus it is necessary to aggregate multiple carriers to achieve widertransmission bandwidth. Carrier aggregation is a technique proposed by3GPP (3rd Generation Partnership Project) to aggregate multiple carriersfor joint transmission, so as to support the higher requirement on thetransmission bandwidth by the future mobile communication systems.According to the position of the carriers to be aggregating in thefrequency spectrum, the carrier aggregation can be classified intocontinuous carrier aggregation and non-continuous carrier aggregation,and LTE-A simultaneously supports both of the two aggregation scenes.While introducing the carrier aggregation technique, 3GPP also takesinto consideration of the backward compatibility. This means that for along period of time in the future, terminals that support carrieraggregation and terminals that do not support carrier aggregation willcoexist, the terminals that support carrier aggregation can accessmultiple carriers at the same time, and the terminals that do notsupport carrier aggregation can access only one carrier.

To simplify the radio resource management in the carrier aggregationscene, a concept of primary component carrier (PCC) will be introducedinto LTE-A. Therefore, the carrier management in the carrier aggregationscene will develop from the distributed management towards thecentralized management. Thus, the primary component carrier willnecessarily have functions a common carrier does not have, playing animportant part in the radio resource management.

Naturally, the carrier corresponding to the cell for the initial accessof the terminal is selected as the primary component carrier. However,with the increasing requirement on the quality of service by the user,it may be necessary to add a new carrier to form the carrieraggregation. With the variation in the terminal, the base station andthe network conditions, it is also possible to replace or delete somecarriers in use. Because of the movement of the user and the differencebetween the performances of the carriers that are aggregating, it may benecessary to re-designate the primary component carrier.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Hereinafter, a brief summary of the present invention will be given, soas to provide basic understanding of some aspects of the presentinvention. It is to be understood that this summary is not an exhaustivesummary about the present invention. It is not intended to determine thekey or important part of the present invention, or to define the scopeof the present invention. It only aims to give some concepts in asimplified form to serve as a preface to the more detailed descriptiondiscussed later.

An object of the present application is to provide a method and a devicefor selecting a component carrier, including a base station and aterminal. A further object of the present application is to provide amethod and a device for updating a primary component carrier, includinga base station and a terminal; a method and a device for adding asecondary component carrier, including a base station and a terminal;and a communication system including the base station and the terminal.

Thus, according to a first aspect of the present application, there isprovided a method for selecting a component carrier in a carrieraggregating communication network, the method including: determining acoverage range of each available carrier that can be used by a terminal;determining whether a distribution of the coverage ranges of differentavailable carriers accords with a predetermined distribution mode; anddetermining a component carrier to be used at least according to a rulethat is decided by the distribution mode, in the case that thedistribution of the coverage ranges of different available carriersaccords with the predetermined distribution mode.

According to another aspect of the present application, there isprovided a method for updating a primary component carrier in a carrieraggregating communication network, the method including: determining anew primary component carrier with the method of the first aspectdescribed above; and switching from an old primary component carrier tothe new primary component carrier.

According to yet another aspect of the present application, there isprovided a method for adding a secondary component carrier in a carrieraggregating communication network, the method including: determining anew secondary component carrier with the method of the first aspectdescribed above; and adding the new secondary component carrier.

According to still another aspect of the present application, there isprovided a device in a carrier aggregating communication network, thedevice including: a terminal information acquiring unit for acquiringposition information of a terminal and/or carrier distributioninformation corresponding to the position of the terminal; a carrierdistribution mode determining unit for determining whether adistribution of the coverage ranges of different available carrierscorresponding to the position of the terminal accords with apredetermined distribution mode; a component carrier determining unitfor determining a component carrier to be used at least according to arule that is decided by the distribution mode, in the case that thedistribution of the coverage ranges of different available carrierscorresponding to the position of the terminal accords with thepredetermined distribution mode; and a notifying unit for notifying thecomponent carrier determined to be used to a counterpart device.

Wherein, the component carrier can be a primary component carrier, andcan also be a secondary component carrier.

The above device can be a base station, and wherein the counterpartdevice is a terminal that communicates with the base station.

The above device can also be a terminal, and wherein the counterpartdevice is a base station that communicates with the terminal.

According to a further aspect of the present application, there isfurther provided a communication system including the above mentionedbase station and/or terminal.

According to the above various embodiments, it is possible to reasonablyselect the component carrier to be used.

Another object of the present application is to provide a method forupdating a primary component carrier, and a corresponding base station,terminal and communication system.

Thus, according to an aspect of the present application, there isprovided a method for updating a primary component carrier in a carrieraggregating communication network, the method including: acquiringstatus information of a terminal, a base station and/or a primarycomponent carrier; determining whether the status information meets apredetermined condition; and replacing an old primary component carrierwith a new primary component carrier in the case that the statusinformation meets the predetermined condition.

According to another aspect of the present application, there isprovided a base station in a carrier aggregating communication network,the base station including: a status acquiring unit for acquiring statusinformation of a terminal, a base station and/or a primary componentcarrier; a status determining unit for determining whether the statusinformation meets a predetermined condition; and a primary componentcarrier updating unit for replacing an old primary component carrierwith a new primary component carrier in the case that the statusinformation meets the predetermined condition.

According to yet another aspect of the present application, there isprovided a terminal adapted for a carrier aggregating communicationnetwork, the terminal including: a reconfiguration information receivingunit for receiving “radio resource control” reconfiguration informationfrom a base station; a radio resource configuring unit for configuring anew primary component carrier according to radio resource configurationinformation contained in the “radio resource control” reconfigurationinformation; and a deactivating unit for deactivating an old primarycomponent carrier according to a presetting or in accordance with adeactivation command sent by a base station.

According to still another aspect of the present application, there isfurther provided a communication system including the above mentionedbase station and terminal.

A further object of the present application is to provide a method and adevice for updating a secondary component carrier, and a correspondingbase station, terminal and communication system.

Therefore, according to an aspect of the present application, there isprovided a method for updating a secondary component carrier in acarrier aggregating communication network, the method including:acquiring status information of a terminal, a base station and/or asecondary component carrier; determining whether the status informationmeets a predetermined condition; and adding a new secondary componentcarrier or replacing an old secondary component carrier with a newsecondary component carrier in the case that the status informationmeets the predetermined condition.

According to another aspect of the present application, there isprovided a base station in a carrier aggregating communication network,the base station including: a status acquiring unit for acquiring statusinformation of a terminal, a base station and/or a secondary componentcarrier; a status determining unit for determining whether the statusinformation meets a predetermined condition; and a secondary componentcarrier updating unit for adding a new secondary component carrier orreplacing an old secondary component carrier with a new secondarycomponent carrier in the case that the status information meets thepredetermined condition.

According to yet another aspect of the present application, there isprovided a terminal adapted for a carrier aggregating communicationnetwork, the terminal including: a reconfiguration information receivingunit for receiving “radio resource control” reconfiguration informationfrom a base station; and a radio resource configuring unit forconfiguring a new secondary component carrier according to radioresource configuration information contained in the “radio resourcecontrol” reconfiguration information.

According to still another aspect of the present application, there isfurther provided a communication system including the above mentionedbase station and terminal.

According to the above various embodiments, it is possible toefficiently update the component carrier to be used.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The above and other objects, characteristics and advantages of thepresent invention will be more easily understood, with reference to thefollowing description of the embodiments of the present invention madein conjunction with the accompanying drawings. In the drawings, the sameor corresponding technical features or components will be denoted by thesame or corresponding reference numerals. The drawings together with thefollowing detailed description are contained in the presentspecification and form a part of the present specification, and areadopted to further illustrate the preferred embodiments of the presentinvention and explain the principle and advantages of the presentinvention. In the drawings:

FIG. 1 is a flowchart of a method for selecting a component carrieraccording to a first embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram of a first scene to which the methodaccording to the first embodiment of the present application is applied;

FIG. 3 is a schematic diagram of a second scene to which the methodaccording to the first embodiment of the present application is applied;

FIG. 4 is a schematic diagram of a third scene to which the methodaccording to the first embodiment of the present application is applied;

FIGS. 5 to 7 are schematic diagrams of three situations of a positionand motion status of a terminal in the third scene shown in FIG. 4;

FIG. 8 is a flowchart of a method for selecting a component carrieraccording to another embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 9 is a schematic diagram of the structure of a terminal adapted toselect a component carrier according to an embodiment of the presentapplication;

FIG. 10 is a schematic diagram of the structure of a terminal adapted toselect a component carrier according to another embodiment of thepresent application;

FIG. 11 is a schematic diagram of the structure of a terminal adapted toselect a component carrier according to yet another embodiment of thepresent application;

FIG. 12 is a schematic diagram of the structure of a base stationadapted to select a component carrier according to an embodiment of thepresent application;

FIG. 13 is a schematic diagram of the structure of a base stationadapted to select a component carrier according to another embodiment ofthe present application;

FIG. 14 is a schematic diagram of the structure of a base stationadapted to select a component carrier according to yet anotherembodiment of the present application;

FIG. 15 is a flowchart of a method for updating a primary componentcarrier according to an embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 16 is a schematic diagram of a handover flow in the method forupdating a primary component carrier;

FIG. 17 is a flowchart of a method for updating a primary componentcarrier according to another embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 18 is a schematic diagram of a reconfiguring flow in the method forupdating a primary component carrier;

FIG. 19 is a schematic diagram of a variation of the reconfiguring flow;

FIGS. 20, 21 and 22 are schematic diagrams of a variation of the flowshown in FIGS. 16, 18 and 19, respectively;

FIGS. 23, 24 and 25 are schematic diagrams of another variation of theflow shown in FIGS. 16, 18 and 19, respectively;

FIG. 26 is a flowchart of a method for updating a secondary componentcarrier according to an embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 27 is a schematic diagram of a reconfiguring flow in the method forupdating a secondary component carrier;

FIG. 28 is a schematic diagram of a variation of the reconfiguring flow;

FIG. 29 is a schematic diagram of the structure of a base stationadapted to update a primary component carrier according to an embodimentof the present application;

FIG. 30 is a schematic diagram of the structure of a base station and acorresponding terminal adapted to update a primary component carrieraccording to another embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 31 is a schematic diagram of the structure of a base station and acorresponding terminal adapted to update a primary component carrieraccording to yet another embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 32 is a schematic diagram of the structure of a base stationadapted to update a secondary component carrier according to anembodiment of the present application; and

FIG. 33 is a schematic diagram of the structure of a base station and acorresponding terminal adapted to update a secondary component carrieraccording to another embodiment of the present application.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

Hereinafter, the exemplary embodiments of the present invention will bedescribed in conjunction with the accompanying drawings. For clarity andconciseness, not all the features of the practical embodiments aredescribed in the specification. However, it is to be understood thatmany embodiment-specific decisions needs to be made during thedevelopment of any of such practical embodiments, so as to achieve thespecific object of the developer, for example, in accordance with thoselimiting conditions related to the system or service, and those limitingconditions may vary with different embodiments. Further, it is also tobe understood that the development work may be very complicated andtime-consuming, but such development work is only a routine task forthose skilled in the art that benefit from the present disclosure.

Further, it is to be noted that only the apparatus configurations and/orprocessing steps closely related to the solution at least based on thepresent invention are shown in the drawings, and other details lessrelated to the present invention are omitted, so as to avoid the burringof the present invention due to unnecessary details.

Particularly, when the connecting relations and the information flowsare referred to, the depictions in the drawings and the descriptions inthe specification only involve the part closely related to the presentinvention, but not exhaust the depictions or list all the connectionsand information flows.

Selection of a Component Carrier First Embodiment

In the present application, a carrier that can be used by a terminal anda base station in a carrier aggregating communication network isreferred to be an available carrier. A carrier that a terminal has beenusing is referred to be a component carrier, which is also an availablecarrier. The component carrier of a terminal that works in a carrieraggregation mode includes one primary component carrier (PCC), and atleast one secondary component carrier (SCC).

In the carrier aggregating communication network, the base station andthe terminal can communicate with each other by using carriers locatedin different frequency bands. For carriers in different frequency bands,a coverage range of a base station antenna usually varies. In view ofthis, the present application proposes adopting different componentcarrier selecting strategies for different distribution modes ofcoverage ranges.

Therefore, as shown in FIG. 1, there is provided a method for selectinga component carrier in a carrier aggregating communication network, andthe method includes the following steps: determining a coverage range ofeach available carrier that can be used by a terminal (step 102);determining whether a distribution of the coverage ranges of differentavailable carriers accords with a predetermined distribution mode (step104); and determining a component carrier to be used at least accordingto a rule that is decided by the distribution mode, in the case that thedistribution of the coverage ranges of different available carriersaccords with the predetermined distribution mode (step 106).

The coverage range of each available carrier for a base station is knownto the base station. Thus, the coverage range of each available carrierthat can be used by a terminal can be obtained based on the position ofthe terminal. Obviously, a certain available carrier can be used by theterminal means that the terminal is within the coverage range of thisavailable carrier. The position of the terminal can be jointly locatedby multiple base stations, and can also be determined by the terminal bymeans of a satellite positioning system, such as the GPS (GlobalPositioning System), and is supplied to the base station.

As described above, the present application proposes adjusting thecomponent carrier selecting strategy according to the distribution modeof the coverage ranges. The present application assumes three potentialapplication scenes, which are respectively shown in FIGS. 2 to 4, anddifferent component carrier selecting strategies can be adopted indifferent scenes. Of course, it is also completely possible to consideronly one or two of the application scenes, or consider more applicationscenes and provide more selecting strategies. For conciseness, there areonly two available carriers in the examples recited in the presentapplication. However, there may be a plurality of available carriers inpractice.

The first application scene, that is, the first distribution mode of thecoverage ranges of the available carriers, is shown in FIG. 2. In thisdistribution mode, each of the base stations 210, 220 and 230respectively uses two carriers F1 and F2, and the cell coverage rangescorresponding to F1 and F2 are substantially coincident with each otherand provide substantially identical coverage regions. In this case, F1and F2 may be within the same carrier frequency hand, and it is a kindof typical continuous carrier aggregation.

In this application scene, the terminal 250 is within both of thecoverage ranges of the two carriers F1 and F2, as long as the terminal250 is within the cell coverage range. Thus, in this case, if no othercondition is considered, the two carriers F1 and F2 have identicalpriority, and any one of the carriers F1 and F2 can be selected randomlyas a new component carrier; alternatively, one carrier is selected fromthe two carriers F1 and F2 with other conditions further taken intoconsideration.

For example, signal quality, interference magnitude, load conditions,and physical resource amount for uplink and physical resource amount fordownlink (such as PDCCH (physical downlink control channel)) of eachcarrier can be used as the basis for selecting the component carrier.Specifically, for a terminal, if it has higher signal quality on acertain carrier, the signal is subjected to less interference on thiscarrier, this carrier has relatively low load and more uplink anddownlink physical resource, the probability that this carrier isselected as the component carrier is relatively higher.

Various factors taken into consideration above can have differentpriority levels or different weights.

In the case that a priority level is set for each factor, the decisionis made based on the factor with a higher priority level. For example,priority levels of any order can be set for the signal quality, thephysical resource amount for uplink and physical resource amount fordownlink, the interference magnitude and the load conditions. That is,based on the setting of the priority levels, the candidate componentcarrier can be determined based on any one of the above factors.Alternatively, different priority level groups can be set for the abovefactors. For example, the priority level of the signal quality and thephysical resource amount for uplink and physical resource amount fordownlink is higher than that of the interference magnitude and the loadconditions; alternatively, an opposite order of priority levels is set,or different priority level groups containing different factors ordifferent number of factors are set. That is, based on the setting ofthe priority level groups and the priority level order of the prioritylevel groups, the candidate component carrier can be determined solelybased on any one group of factors.

A weight (which may be same or different depending on the situation) canbe set for each factor, inside each of the above priority level groups,for example, in the group consisting of the signal quality and thephysical resource amount for uplink and physical resource amount fordownlink.

In the case that different weights are set for different factors, theinfluence of each factor on the selecting of the component carrier istaken into consideration synthetically. Depending on the requirement inpractice, any weight distribution can be set. Generally, the weight ofthe signal quality and the physical resource amount for uplink andphysical resource amount for downlink can be set higher than that of theinterference magnitude and the load conditions.

In the second application scene, that is, the second distribution modeof the coverage ranges of the available carriers, as shown in FIG. 3,each of the base stations 310, 320 and 330 respectively uses twocarriers F3 and F4, and the coverage range of F4 is larger andsubstantially contains the coverage range of F3. The cell correspondingto F4 mainly ensures the coverage, and the cell corresponding to F3 ismainly used to improve the throughput. In this case, F3 and F4 may bewithin different carrier frequency bands, and it is a non-continuouscarrier aggregation.

In this application scene, when the terminal 250 is only within thecoverage range of F4 but not within the coverage range of F3, there isno problem of carrier selection, since there is only one availablecarrier, i.e., F4. When the terminal 250 is within the coverage rangesof F3 and F4 at the same time, there is a problem of carrier selection.According to an embodiment proposed by the present application, in thiscase, if no other condition is considered, the carrier with largercoverage range, that is F4, can be selected as the new componentcarrier. If there are multiple carriers with larger coverage range andthe coverage ranges are substantially the same, then the componentcarrier is further selected in further accordance with the selectingstrategy in the first scene, which will be described in more detailhereinafter.

Of course, similar to the first scene, one carrier can be selected withother condition further taken into consideration.

For example, likewise, the signal quality, the interference magnitude,the load conditions, and the physical resource amount for uplink andphysical resource amount for downlink (such as PDCCH, etc.) of eachcarrier can also be used as the basis for selecting the componentcarrier. Specifically, for a terminal, if it has higher signal qualityon a certain carrier, the signal is subjected to less interference onthis carrier, this carrier has relatively low load and more uplink anddownlink physical resource, the probability that this carrier isselected as the component carrier is relatively higher.

Various factors taken into consideration above, including the coveragerange of each available carrier, can have different priority levels ordifferent weights.

In the case that a priority level is set for each factor, the decisionis made based on the factor with a higher priority level. For example,priority levels of any order can be set for the coverage range of theavailable carrier, the signal quality, the physical resource amount foruplink and physical resource amount for downlink, the interferencemagnitude and the load conditions. That is, based on the setting of thepriority levels, the candidate component carrier can be determined basedon any one of the above factors. Alternatively, different priority levelgroups can be set for the above factors. For example, the priority levelof the coverage range is higher than that of the signal quality and thephysical resource amount for uplink and physical resource amount fordownlink, the priority level of the signal quality and the physicalresource amount for uplink and physical resource amount for downlink ishigher than that of the interference magnitude and the load conditions;alternatively, an opposite order of priority levels is set, or differentpriority level groups containing different factors or different numberof factors are set. That is, based on the setting of the priority levelgroups and the priority level order of the priority level groups, thecandidate component carrier can be determined solely based on any onegroup of factors.

A weight (which may be same or different depending on the situation) canbe set for each factor, inside each of the above priority level groups,for example, in the group consisting of the signal quality and thephysical resource amount for uplink and physical resource amount fordownlink.

In the case that different weights are set for different factors, theinfluence of each factor on the selecting of the component carrier istaken into consideration synthetically. Depending on the requirement inpractice, any weight distribution can be set. Generally, the weight ofthe coverage range can be set higher than that of the signal quality andthe physical resource amount for uplink and physical resource amount fordownlink, and the weight of the signal quality and the physical resourceamount for uplink and physical resource amount for downlink can be sethigher than that of the interference magnitude and the load conditions.

In the third application scene, that is, the third distribution mode ofthe coverage ranges of the available carriers, as shown in FIG. 4, eachof the base stations 410, 420 and 430 respectively uses two carriers F5and F6, and the coverage ranges of the two available carriers aresubstantially neither coincident with each other nor contained one inthe other but overlapped with each other. The cell corresponding to F5mainly ensures the coverage, and the cell corresponding to F6 is mainlyused to improve the throughput (or vice versa). This application sceneis characterized in that the antenna of the cell corresponding to F6 isdirected to the edge region in the cell corresponding to F5, which willgreatly improve the throughput of the edge region in the cellcorresponding to F5. In this situation, F5 and F6 may be withindifferent carrier frequency bands, and it is a non-continuous carrieraggregation.

In this application scene, when the terminal 250 is only within thecoverage range of F5 or only within the coverage range of F6, there isno problem of carrier selection, since there is only one availablecarrier, i.e., F5 or F6. When the terminal 250 is within the coverageranges of F5 and F6 at the same time, that is, in the overlap region ofthe coverage ranges of the two available carriers, the problem ofcarrier selection occurs.

According to an embodiment provided by the present application, in thissituation, if no other condition is considered, the candidate componentcarrier can be determined at least according to the position where theterminal is located and the moving direction and moving speed of theterminal.

In this application, three modes for the position and motion of theterminal are assumed, as shown in FIG. 5 to FIG. 7. However, it is to beunderstood that the position and motion of the terminal can be dividedin other manners, and the three modes herein can be varied, split orcombined as well.

The first mode is shown in FIG. 5, and the terminal 250 is at the edgeof the available carrier F5 and is leaving away from this availablecarrier. In this case, if the terminal is leaving away from thisavailable carrier quickly, a higher probability of becoming thecandidate component carrier will be assigned to the available carrier(F6 here) corresponding to the leaving direction. Of course, the carriercorresponding to the leaving direction can be directly selected as thecandidate component carrier, that is, the probability is 100%. If thereare multiple available carriers corresponding to the leaving direction(besides F6, there still exists other available carriers), then thecandidate component carrier are selected from the multiple availablecarriers at least according to the size of the coverage range, that is,similar to the first or second application scene as described above.

Leaving “quickly” is mentioned above. Here, “quickly” means thataccording to the speed of the terminal, it is predicted that theterminal will be soon out of the carrier coverage range within which theterminal is currently located, but not only move in a small range. Forexample, if the user of the terminal just walks around in a small range,but may not intend to go out of this carrier coverage range (for examplego to another place), unnecessary operations will be induced if thecarrier is updated at this time. In the specific application, how highspeed is actually meant by “quickly” can be particularly set accordingto the practical application.

FIG. 6 illustrates another mode for position and motion of the terminal,that is, the terminal 250 is at the edge of a certain available carrierF5 and is moving into this available carrier F5. In this situation, thecandidate component carrier can be determined at least according to thesize of the coverage ranges of the available carriers F5 and F6, thatis, similar to the second application scene. If the coverage ranges arejust the same, the selecting strategy in the first scene will beapplied.

FIG. 7 illustrates another mode for position and motion of the terminal,that is, the terminal 250 is at a position in the overlap region of theavailable carriers F5 and F6 but far away from the edge of the overlapregion, i.e., within the overlap region. In this situation, thecandidate component carrier can also be determined at least according tothe size of the coverage ranges of the available carriers F5 and F6,that is, similar to the second application scene. If the coverage rangesare just the same, the selecting strategy in the first scene will beapplied.

Of course, similar to the first and second application scenes, onecarrier can be selected with other conditions further taken intoconsideration.

For example, likewise, the signal quality, the interference magnitude,the load conditions, and the physical resource amount for uplink andphysical resource amount for downlink (such as PDCCH) of each carriercan also be used as the basis for selecting the component carrier. Thesefactors, including the position where the terminal is located and themoving direction and moving speed of the terminal, and the coveragerange of each available carrier, can have different priority levels ordifferent weights.

In the case that a priority level is set for each factor, the decisionis made based on the factor with a higher priority level. For example,priority levels of any order can be set for the position of theterminal, the moving direction of the terminal, the moving speed of theterminal, the coverage range of the available carrier, the signalquality, the physical resource amount for uplink and physical resourceamount for downlink, the interference magnitude and the load conditions.That is, based on the setting of the priority levels, the candidatecomponent carrier can be determined based on any one of the abovefactors. Alternatively, different priority level groups can be set forthe above factors. For example, the priority level of the position ofthe terminal, the moving direct ion of the terminal, the moving speed ofthe terminal and the coverage range of the available carrier is higherthan that of the signal quality and the physical resource amount foruplink and physical resource amount for downlink, and the priority levelof the signal quality and the physical resource amount for uplink andphysical resource amount for downlink is higher than that of theinterference magnitude and the load conditions; alternatively, anopposite order of priority levels is set, or different priority levelgroups containing different factors or different number of factors areset. That is, based on the setting of the priority level groups and thepriority level order of the priority level groups, the component carriercan be selected based solely on any one group of factors.

A weight (which may be same or different depending on the situation) canbe set for each factor, inside each of the above priority level groups,for example, in the group consisting of the signal quality and thephysical resource amount for uplink and physical resource amount fordownlink.

In the case that different weights are set for different factors, theinfluence of each factor on the selecting of the component carrier istaken into consideration synthetically. Depending on the requirement inpractice, any weight distribution can be set. Generally, the weight ofthe position of the terminal, the moving direction of the terminal, themoving speed of the terminal and the coverage range of the availablecarrier can be set higher than that of the signal quality and thephysical resource amount for uplink and physical resource amount fordownlink, and the weight of the signal quality and the physical resourceamount for uplink and physical resource amount for downlink can be sethigher than that of the interference magnitude and the load conditions.

Second Embodiment

In the first embodiment, the selecting of the component carrier has beendescribed with respect to different application scenes. In the practicalapplication, various application scenes may be mixed, as described inthe above. For example, the coverage ranges of each available carriermay be completely coincident with each other (the first applicationscene), and may have inclusion relation (the second application scene)or partially overlapped with each other (the third application scene).

Therefore, as shown in FIG. 8, according to an embodiment proposed bythe present application, the candidate component carrier are selected bysuccessively using selecting strategies adapted for differentapplication scenes, so as to reduce the scope of the candidate componentcarriers, until the component carrier to be used is derived. That is, onthe basis of the first embodiment, when the distribution of the coverageranges of different available carriers includes at least twopredetermined modes, the candidate component carriers are firstlydetermined in accordance with the rule corresponding to one of themodes, and then the secondary candidate component carriers are selectedfrom the candidate component carriers in accordance with the rulecorresponding to another mode, until a unique candidate componentcarrier is derived.

Specifically, as shown in FIG. 8, the coverage range of each availablecarrier that can be used by the terminal is firstly determined (step102). Then it is determined whether the distribution of the coverageranges of different available carriers accords with predetermineddistribution mode (step 104). The two steps have been described indetail in the first embodiment, which will not be repeated here.

In the case that it is determined that the coverage range has multipledistribution modes, such as the first mode 806 and the second mode 910,the candidate component carriers can be firstly determined in accordancewith the first rule corresponding to the first mode (step 808). Forexample, if the first mode is the third application scene describedpreviously, then the selecting strategy for the component carrier in thethird application scene is adopted to select the candidate componentcarriers. The determined candidate component carrier may be unique, withwhich the flow is ended, and the determined candidate component carrieris used. The determined candidate component carriers may also be notunique. For example, in the third application scene, if there existmultiple available carriers in the moving direction of the terminal, andthe factors in other aspects of each available carrier or the factorstaken into consideration in accordance with the selecting strategy aresubstantially the same, there may be multiple available carriers thatcan be used as the candidate component carriers. At this time, it isnecessary to continue selecting among the multiple candidate componentcarriers by using the second rule corresponding to the second mode (forexample, the selecting strategy corresponding to the first or secondapplication scene) (step 812), so as to derive the component carrier tobe used.

FIG. 8 only illustrates the situation with two distribution modes.Obviously, there may be multiple distribution modes, and the applicationorder of the selecting strategies for the various distribution modes canbe optional.

Third Embodiment

Further, when the terminal operates in the carrier aggregation mode,besides one primary component carrier, there are still one or moresecondary component carriers (SCC) operating at the same time, which areall in the activated status. Meanwhile, it is also possible that thereare one or more carriers in configured but in-activated status, and itis also possible that there are one or more carriers in un-configuredstatus.

When it is necessary to change the primary component carrier, a newprimary component carrier can be selected from the secondary componentcarriers already in use, and can also be selected from the availablecarriers that have not been configured yet or that have been configuredbut not activated yet. When it is necessary to add a secondary componentcarrier, a new secondary component carrier can be selected from theavailable carriers that have not been configured, and can also beselected from the available carriers that have been configured but notactivated yet.

Obviously, the carriers in different status have different operationcomplexities when being added. Therefore, on the basis of the firstembodiment and the second embodiment, the activation and configurationstatus of each available carrier can be obtained firstly when thecomponent carrier is selected, so as to further take into considerationof the activation and configuration status of each available carrierwhen the candidate component carrier is determined. Wherein, thepriority level of the available carrier in the activated status ishigher than that of the available carrier that has been configured butnot activated, and the priority level of the available carrier that hasbeen configured but not activated is higher than that of the availablecarrier that has not been configured.

Here, “higher priority level” means higher weight, or in somesituations, for example, in the case that other conditions are the sameor similar, it means playing a decisive role.

Fourth Embodiment

The method for selecting the component carrier described in the first tothird embodiments can be used to select the primary component carrier.

The carrier corresponding to the cell for the initial access of theterminal, or the carrier used during the connection re-establishing bythe terminal, is naturally defaulted as the primary component carrier.However, with variations in the terminal, the base station status andthe network conditions, it may be necessary to update the primarycomponent carrier. At this time, a new primary component carrier can bedetermined by using the method for selecting the component carrierdescribed in the first to third embodiments, and then the old primarycomponent carrier is switched to the new primary component carrier.

The switching from the old primary component carrier to the new primarycomponent carrier can be performed in various manners, and there alreadyexists various manners in the prior art. In the present application, theapplicant proposes a new flow for updating the primary componentcarrier, which will be described in detail in the following embodiments.

The updating of the primary component carrier can be performed severaltimes. In the updating of the primary component carrier for the firsttime when the terminal initially accesses the cell or after theconnection is re-established, the old primary component carrier is theinitial primary component carrier, that is, the carrier that is usedduring the initial access of the terminal or the re-establishing of theradio resource connection, which is defaulted as the primary componentcarrier.

The carrier aggregation may involve different frequency bands. That is,each carrier that can be used by the terminal may be within the samefrequency band, and may be within different frequency bands. Whether theprimary component carriers before and after updating are within the samefrequency band will affect the overhead required when updating theprimary component carrier. Therefore, the frequency relationship betweenthe available carriers can also be taken into consideration for theupdating of the primary component carrier.

Specifically, during the updating of the primary component carrier, thefrequency spectrum information of each available carrier can be acquiredat first, and then the relationship between the frequency of eachavailable carrier and the old primary component carrier is also takeninto consideration for determining the candidate component carrier.Among the available carriers with the same activation and configurationstatus, the available carriers within the same frequency band as the oldprimary component carrier have higher priority levels. Likewise, “higherpriority level” means higher weight, or in some situations, for example,in the case that other conditions are the same or similar, it meansplaying a decisive role.

Fifth Embodiment

The method for selecting the component carrier described in the first tothird embodiments can be used to select the secondary component carrier.

The carrier corresponding to the cell for the initial access of theterminal, or the carrier used during the connection re-establishing bythe terminal, is naturally defaulted as the primary component carrier.However, with the increasing requirement on the quality of service bythe user, it may be necessary to add a new carrier to form the carrieraggregation.

In this case, at first, a new secondary component carrier can bedetermined by using the method for selecting the component carrierdescribed in the first to third embodiments, and then the new secondarycomponent carrier is added. The adding of the secondary componentcarrier can be performed in various manners, and there already existsvarious manners in the prior art. In the present application, theapplicant also proposes a new flow for adding the secondary componentcarrier, which will be described in detail in the following embodiments.

Sixth Embodiment

In the communication system, the method for selecting the componentcarrier described in the first to fifth embodiments can be performed bythe base station with the assistance of the terminal, and can also beperformed by the terminal with the assistance of the base station.

Therefore, in this embodiment, a terminal that is can implement thevarious embodiments described above is proposed firstly.

In the description of the terminal and the base station in thisembodiment and the following various embodiments, unless necessary, thedetailed description of the various embodiments described above will notbe repeated any more, and reference can be made to the description ofthe various embodiments described above.

As shown in FIG. 9, a terminal 920 adapted for a carrier aggregatingcommunication network communicates with a base station 960, determinesthe component carrier with the assistance of the base station 960, andnotifies the component carrier to the base station 960. Specifically,the terminal 920 includes: a terminal information acquiring unit 902 foracquiring the terminal position information and/or the carrierdistribution information corresponding to the terminal position; acarrier distribution mode determining unit 904 for determining whetherthe distribution of the coverage ranges of different available carrierscorresponding to the position of the terminal accords with thepredetermined distribution mode; a component carrier determining unit906 for determining the component carrier to be used at least accordingto the rule that is decided by the distribution mode in the case thatthe distribution of the coverage ranges of different available carrierscorresponding to the position of the terminal accords with thepredetermined distribution mode; and a notifying unit 908 for notifyingthe component carrier determined to be used to the base station (process(4)).

The object of the terminal information acquiring unit 902 is to acquirethe information on the coverage range of the carrier that can be used bythe terminal, so that the carrier distribution mode determining unit candetermine the distribution mode of the coverage ranges of the availablecarriers. The information on the coverage range of the available carriermust be determined based on the position of the terminal and theparameter of the carrier of the base station. The position of theterminal can be jointly determined by multiple base stations 960, andcan also be determined by the terminal 920 by means of the satellitepositioning system 940, such as the GPS (Global Positioning System).

Therefore, in the case of satellite positioning, the terminalinformation acquiring unit 902 can include a positioning device that isbuilt in the terminal and communicates with the satellite positioningsystem (process (1)), which positioning device transfers the position ofthe terminal to the base station 960 (process (2)), and based on theterminal position information, the base station 960 transfers theinformation on the coverage range of the available carrier to theterminal information acquiring unit 902 (process (3)). In a variation ofthe embodiment, the terminal 902 can acquire the information on thecoverage range of the available carrier without the base station 960.For example, the terminal 902 can determine whether itself is within thecoverage range of a certain carrier by detecting the signal intensity ofeach carrier. In this case, as for the determining of the coverage rangeof the available carrier, the processes (2) and (3) are not needed.

Further, in the case of base station positioning, since the position ofthe terminal is obtained by the base station, the base station canobtain the information on the coverage range of the available carrierdirectly according to this position, so that the terminal informationacquiring unit 902 in the terminal can acquire the information from thebase station 960 directly (process (3)).

If the carrier distribution mode determining unit 904 determines thatthe predetermined distribution mode is that the coverage ranges of theavailable carriers are substantially the same, the component carrierdetermining unit 906 takes all the available carriers as the candidatecomponent carriers.

If the carrier distribution mode determining unit 904 determines thatthe predetermined distribution mode is that there exists at least oneavailable carrier the coverage ranges of which is substantiallycontained within the coverage range of at least one other availablecarrier, the component carrier determining unit 906 determines thecandidate component carrier at least according to the size of thecoverage range.

If the carrier distribution mode determining unit 904 determines thatthe predetermined distribution mode is that there exist at least twoavailable carriers the coverage ranges of which are substantially notcoincident with each other nor contained one in the other but overlappedwith each other, the terminal information acquiring unit 902 acquiresinformation on the moving direction and moving speed of the terminal,and the component carrier determining unit 906 is further configured todetermine the candidate component carrier at least according to theposition of the terminal and the moving direction and moving speedthereof.

The moving direction and moving speed of the terminal are determinedbased on the positions of the terminal at different time instants. Asmentioned above, the position of the terminal can be determined by itsinbuilt satellite positioning device, and can also be determined by thebase station 960. In whatever cases, the moving direction and movingspeed of the terminal can be calculated by the terminal informationacquiring unit based on the position information obtained from thesatellite positioning device or the base station 960. In the case thatthe position information is obtained from the base station 960, the basestation 960 can provide the position information of the terminal to theterminal information acquiring unit by means of the process (3) (whichcertainly can be other process).

Further, in the case that the position of the terminal is calculated bythe base station 960, the calculating of the moving direction and movingspeed of the terminal can evidently also be performed by the basestation 960. In this situation, the base station 960 only needs todirectly provide the position information of the terminal and theinformation on the moving direction and moving speed of the terminal tothe terminal information acquiring unit by means of the process (3)(which certainly can be other process).

Thus, the component carrier determining unit 906 can be furtherconfigured so that if the information obtained by the terminalinformation acquiring unit 902 indicates that the terminal is at theedge of a certain available carrier and is leaving away from thisavailable carrier quickly, then a higher probability of becoming thecandidate component carrier is assigned to the available carriercorresponding to the leaving direction; and if the information obtainedby the terminal information acquiring unit 902 indicates that theterminal is at the edge of a certain available carrier and is movingtowards the interior of this available carrier, or if the terminal is ina position within the overlap region but far away from the edge of theoverlap region, then the candidate component carrier can be determinedat least according to the size of the coverage range.

The component carrier determining unit 906 can be further configured sothat if there are multiple available carriers corresponding to theleaving direction, then the candidate component carrier can be selectedfrom the multiple available carriers at least according to the size ofthe coverage range.

The component carrier determining unit 906 can be further configured todetermine the candidate component carrier at least according to at leastone of the following factors: the signal quality, the physical resourceamount for uplink and physical resource amount for downlink, theinterference magnitude and the load conditions.

Here, the signal quality is the information that can be obtained by theterminal itself in accordance with the conventional techniques, and theinterference of other base stations, carriers, terminals or the like onthe current terminal is also the information that can be obtained basedon the signal quality in accordance with the conventional techniques.The physical resource amount for uplink and physical resource amount fordownlink and the load conditions are the information that can beobtained from the base station based on the conventional techniques (seeprocess (5) in FIG. 10). If the interference of the current terminal onother terminals is taken into consideration, it is necessary to acquirethe related information from the base station (the base station acquiresthe information from the report of other terminals).

The component carrier determining unit 906 can be further configured sothat for determining the candidate component carrier, the importance ofthe coverage range, the position of the terminal, and the movingdirection and moving speed of the terminal is higher than that of thesignal quality and the physical resource amount for uplink and physicalresource amount for downlink, and the importance of the signal qualityand the physical resource amount for uplink and physical resource amountfor downlink is higher than that of the interference magnitude and theload conditions; alternatively, the candidate component carrier can bedetermined by any one factor or by multiple factors among the coveragerange, the position of the terminal and the moving direction and movingspeed of the terminal, the signal quality, the physical resource amountfor uplink and physical resource amount for downlink, the interferencemagnitude and the load conditions.

The component carrier determining unit 906 can be further configured sothat when the distribution of the coverage ranges of different availablecarriers includes at least two predetermined modes, the candidatecomponent carriers are firstly determined in accordance with the rulecorresponding to one of the modes, and then the secondary candidatecomponent carriers are selected from the candidate component carriers inaccordance with the rule corresponding to another mode, until a uniquecandidate component carrier is derived.

The terminal can further include a carrier status acquiring unit 910(FIG. 11) for acquiring the activation and configuration status of eachavailable carrier. The component carrier determining unit 906 can befurther configured so that the activation and configuration status ofeach available carrier is also taken into consideration for determiningthe candidate component carrier. The priority level of the availablecarrier that is in the activated status is higher than that of theavailable carrier that has been configured but not activated, and thepriority level of the available carrier that has been configured but notactivated is higher than that of the available carrier that has not beenconfigured.

It is to be noted that the embodiment shown in FIG. 11 does not have theprocess (5) in FIG. 10. However, it can be seen from the abovedescription that in another variation, there can be the process (5) inFIG. 10.

The component carrier determined by the terminal of this embodiment canbe the primary component carrier, and can also be the secondarycomponent carrier.

When being used to determine the primary component carrier, thecomponent carrier determining unit 906 can be further configured so thatthe relationship between the frequency of each available carrier and theold primary component carrier is also taken into consideration fordetermining the candidate component carrier. Among the availablecarriers with the same activation and configuration status, theavailable carriers within the same frequency band as the old primarycomponent carrier have a higher priority level.

The above description of the present embodiment discloses a terminalthat interacts with the base station. Obviously, it also discloses acommunication system consisting of the above terminal and the basestation that communicates with the terminal.

Seventh Embodiment

The sixth embodiment has described the terminal for implementing themethod for selecting the component carrier described in the first tofifth embodiments. The seventh embodiment will describe the base stationfor implementing the method for selecting the component carrierdescribed in the first to fifth embodiments.

In the description of the terminal and the base station in this and thefollowing embodiments, unless necessary, the detailed description of thevarious embodiments described above will not be repeated any more, andreference can be made to the description of the various embodimentsdescribed above.

As shown in FIG. 12, a base station 1220 in a carrier aggregatingcommunication network communicates with a terminal 1260, determines thecomponent carrier with the assistance of the terminal 1260, and notifiesthe component carrier to the terminal 1260. Specifically, the basestation 1220 includes: a terminal information acquiring unit 1202 foracquiring the terminal position information and/or the carrierdistribution information corresponding to the terminal position; acarrier distribution mode determining unit 1204 for determining whetherthe distribution of the coverage ranges of different available carrierscorresponding to the position of the terminal accords with thepredetermined distribution mode; a component carrier determining unit1206 for determining the component carrier to be used at least accordingto the rule that is decided by the distribution mode, in the case thatthe distribution of the coverage ranges of different available carrierscorresponding to the position of the terminal accords with thepredetermined distribution mode; and a notifying unit 1208 for notifyingthe component carrier determined to be used to the terminal (process(4)).

The object of the terminal information acquiring unit 1202 is to acquirethe information on the coverage range of the carrier that can be used bythe terminal, so that the carrier distribution mode determining unit candetermine the distribution mode of the coverage ranges of the availablecarriers. The information on the coverage range of the available carriermust be determined based on the position of the terminal and theparameter of the carrier of the base station. The position of theterminal can be measured by the base station 1220 itself, and can alsobe determined by the terminal 1260 by means of the satellite positioningsystem 940, such as the GPS (Global Positioning System) (process 1).

Therefore, in the case of satellite positioning, the terminalinformation acquiring unit 1202 can obtain from the terminal 1260 thepositioning information of the inbuilt positioning device (process (2)),so as to further obtain the information on the coverage range of thecarrier that can be used by the terminal based on the information on theavailable carrier of the base station.

Further, in the case of base station positioning, since the position ofthe terminal is obtained by the base station, the base station canobtain the information on the coverage range of the available carrierdirectly according to this position.

If the carrier distribution mode determining unit 1204 determines thatthe predetermined distribution mode is that the coverage ranges of theavailable carriers are substantially the same, the component carrierdetermining unit 1206 takes all the available carriers as the candidatecomponent carriers.

If the carrier distribution mode determining unit 1204 determines thatthe predetermined distribution mode is that there exists at least oneavailable carrier the coverage range of which is substantially containedwithin the coverage range of at least one other available carrier, thecomponent carrier determining unit 1206 determines the candidatecomponent carrier at least according to the size of the coverage range.

If the carrier distribution mode determining unit 1204 determines thatthe predetermined distribution mode is that there exist at least twoavailable carriers the coverage ranges of which are substantially notcoincident with each other nor contained one in the other but overlappedwith each other, the terminal information acquiring unit 1202 acquiresthe information on the moving direction and moving speed of theterminal, and the component carrier determining unit 1206 is furtherconfigured to determine the candidate component carrier at leastaccording to the position of the terminal and the moving direction andmoving speed thereof.

The moving direction and moving speed of the terminal are determinedbased on the positions of the terminal at different time instants. Asmentioned above, the positions of the terminal can be determined by itsinbuilt satellite positioning device, and can also be determined by thebase station 1220. In whatever cases, the moving direction and movingspeed of the terminal can be calculated by the terminal informationacquiring unit based on the position information obtained from theterminal 1260 or the position of the terminal calculated by the basestation.

Further, in the case that the position of the terminal is obtained bythe terminal 1260 by means of the satellite positioning device, thecalculating of the moving direction and moving speed of the terminal cancertainly also be performed by the terminal itself. In this situation,the terminal 1260 only needs to directly provide the positioninformation of the terminal and the information on the moving directionand moving speed of the terminal to the terminal information acquiringunit 1202 by means of the process (2) (which of course can be otherprocess).

Thus, the component carrier determining unit 1206 can be furtherconfigured so that if the information obtained by the terminalinformation acquiring unit 1202 indicates that the terminal is at theedge of a certain available carrier and is leaving away from thisavailable carrier quickly, then a higher probability of becoming thecandidate component carrier is assigned to the available carriercorresponding to the leaving direction; and if the information obtainedby the terminal information acquiring unit 1202 indicates that theterminal is at the edge of a certain available carrier and is movingtowards the interior of this available carrier, or if the terminal is ina position within the overlap region but far away from the edge of theoverlap region, then the candidate component carrier can be determinedat least according to the size of the coverage range.

The component carrier determining unit 1206 can be further configured sothat if there are multiple available carriers corresponding to theleaving direction, then the candidate component carrier can be selectedfrom the multiple available carriers at least according to the size ofthe coverage range.

The component carrier determining unit 1206 can be further configured todetermine the candidate component carrier at least according to at leastone of the following factors: the signal quality, the physical resourceamount for uplink and physical resource amount for downlink, theinterference magnitude and the load conditions.

Here, the signal quality is the information that can be obtained by theterminal itself in accordance with the conventional techniques, and theinterference of other base stations, carriers, terminals or the like onthe current terminal is also the information that can be obtained by theterminal based on the signal quality in accordance with the conventionaltechniques. The physical resource amount for uplink and physicalresource amount for downlink and the load conditions are the informationthat can be held by the base station itself based on the conventionaltechniques. If the interference of the current terminal on otherterminals is taken into consideration, the related information isobtained by the base station based on the information reported by otherterminals. Therefore, the component carrier determining unit 1206obtains the related information from the terminal 1260 as required (seeprocess (5) in FIG. 13).

The component carrier determining unit 1206 can be further configured sothat for determining the candidate component carrier, the importance ofthe coverage range, the position of the terminal, and the movingdirection and moving speed of the terminal is higher than that of thesignal quality and the physical resource amount for uplink and physicalresource amount for downlink, and the importance of the signal qualityand the physical resource amount for uplink and physical resource amountfor downlink is higher than that of the interference magnitude and theload conditions; alternatively, the candidate component carrier can bedetermined by any one factor or by multiple factors among the coveragerange the position of the terminal and the moving direction and movingspeed of the terminal, the signal quality, the physical resource amountfor uplink and physical resource amount for downlink, the interferencemagnitude and the load conditions.

The component carrier determining unit 1206 can be further configured sothat when the distribution of the coverage ranges of different availablecarriers includes at least two predetermined modes, the candidatecomponent carriers are firstly determined in accordance with the rulecorresponding to one of the modes, and then the secondary candidatecomponent carriers are selected from the candidate component carriers inaccordance with the rule corresponding to another mode, until a uniquecandidate component carrier is derived.

The base station can further include a carrier status acquiring unit1210 for acquiring the activation and configuration status of eachavailable carrier. The component carrier determining unit 1206 can befurther configured so that the activation and configuration status ofeach available carrier is also taken into consideration for determiningthe candidate component carrier. The priority level of the availablecarriers in the activated status is higher than that of the availablecarriers configured but not activated, and the priority level of theavailable carrier configured but not activated is higher than that ofthe available carrier that has not been configured. Here, the activationand configuration status of the available carrier is the status of theterminal itself, thus the base station of this embodiment needs toobtain from the terminal 1260 the activation and configuration statusinformation of the available carrier of this terminal through theprocess (6) (FIG. 14).

It is to be noted that the embodiment shown in FIG. 14 does not have theprocess (5) in FIG. 13. However, it can be seen from the abovedescription that in another variation, there can be the process (5) inFIG. 13.

The component carrier determined by the base station of this embodimentcan be the primary component carrier, and can also be the secondarycomponent carrier.

When being used to determine the primary component carrier, thecomponent carrier determining unit 1206 can be further configured sothat the relationship between the frequency of each available carrierand the old primary component carrier is also taken into considerationfor determining the candidate component carrier. Among the availablecarriers with the same activation and configuration status, theavailable carriers within the same frequency band as the old primarycomponent carrier have a higher priority level.

The above description of the present embodiment discloses a base stationthat interacts with the terminal. Obviously, it also discloses acommunication system consisting of the above base station and theterminal that communicates with the base station.

Updating of a Component Carrier Eighth Embodiment

The above embodiments have described how to select a component carrier,including the primary component carrier and the secondary componentcarrier.

After the component carrier is selected, it is necessary to switch fromthe old primary component carrier to the selected new primary componentcarrier by using a suitable flow, or add the selected new secondarycomponent carrier, or replace a certain old secondary component carrierwith the selected new secondary component carrier (actually thecombination of an adding action and a deleting action). Further, it isalso necessary to appropriately determine the opportunity for updatingor adding the component carrier.

Therefore, as shown in FIG. 15, in this embodiment, there is proposed amethod for updating the primary component carrier in the carrieraggregating communication network, and the method includes the followingsteps: acquiring the status information of the terminal, the basestation and/or the primary component carrier (step 1502); determiningwhether the status information meets the predetermined condition (step1504); and replacing the old primary component carrier with the newprimary component carrier in the case that the status information meetsthe predetermined condition (step 1506).

In the prior art, there may be various parameters for representing theterminal, the base station, the performance and status of the componentcarrier in use and the carrier that can be used by the base station, andthe like. The related information can be obtained by various measurementor communication means. For such information, various predeterminedconditions can be set according to the requirement in the practicalapplication, and the primary component carrier will be updated when thepredetermined condition is satisfied.

As an illustrative example but not the restrictive enumeration, theconditions taken into consideration for updating the primary componentcarrier can include at least one of the following:

1. The terminal moves out of the coverage range of the old primarycomponent carrier;

2. The signal quality of the old primary component carrier is degraded;

3. The physical resource amount for uplink and physical resource amountfor downlink of the old primary component carrier is not enough;

4. The original base station requires to update the primary componentcarrier considering problems such as the balance of the overall load ofthe network and the interference between the users; and

5. The terminal moves into the coverage range of the new base station.

The updating of the primary component carrier can be implemented byusing the handover flow, and can also be implemented by using thereconfiguring flow. As shown in FIG. 16, in the handover flow, the basestation which the old primary component carrier belongs to transmits“radio resource control (RRC)” reconfiguration information to theterminal. The “radio resource control” reconfiguration informationincludes mobility control information which includes radio resourceconfiguration information of the new primary component carrier. Then,the terminal reconfigures MAC (Medium Access Control), PDCP (Packet DataConvergence Protocol) and RLC (Radio Link Control) layers and updatesthe security key by using the mobility control information in the “radioresource control” reconfiguration information, and configures the newprimary component carrier by using the radio resource configurationinformation of the new primary component carrier.

Then a random access process is initiated, for accessing the new primarycomponent carrier. The random access process can be initiated by theterminal, or initiated by the base station. If the random access processis initiated by the terminal, the random access process is a competitiveprocess, in which the access request is made by the terminal and thebase station the new primary component carrier belongs to performs theassignation according to the resource and the access requests from otherterminals, that is, the random access is a process during which theterminals grab the resource. If the random access is unsuccessful, itmay be retried as required, or it is necessary to reconfigure the radioresource configuration information, or it is necessary to re-switch. Ifthe random access process is initiated by the base station the newprimary component carrier belongs to, then the base station has alreadyreserved corresponding resource for the terminal in advance. Therefore,the terminal only needs to respond to this, unless the situation at theside of the terminal changes. Such random access is referred to be anon-competitive random access.

After the new primary component carrier is accessed, the old primarycomponent carrier can be deactivated. The deactivating can be performedin two manners. One manner is that the base station the new primarycomponent carrier belongs to directly transmits a deactivating commandto the terminal (as shown in FIG. 16), and the terminal deactivates theold primary component carrier after receiving the deactivating command.The other manner is to deactivate the old primary component carrier inan implicit deactivating manner (not shown in FIG. 16), that is, theterminal does not need to receive the deactivating command from the basestation, but auto-deactivates the old primary component carrier. Suchautomatic action can be for example performed based on a timer, that is,the system defines in advance the time for deactivating the old primarycomponent carrier, or defines in advance the trigger condition for thedeactivating timer.

It is to be noted that “the base station the new primary componentcarrier belongs to” and “the base station the old primary componentcarrier belongs to” are mentioned here. When the new and old primarycomponent carriers belong to the same base station, the above two termsrefer to the same base station.

As described above, the updating of the primary component carrier canalso be performed by using the reconfiguring flow. As shown in FIG. 18,as compared with the handover flow, the reconfiguring flow can be freeof random access process and key updating process. Further, the contentof the RRC reconfiguration information is simplified, not including themobility control information but only including the radio resourceconfiguration information of the new primary component carrier.Therefore, after receiving the RRC reconfiguration information, theterminal only needs to configure the new primary component carrier, butdoes not need to reconfigure the MAC, PDCP, RLC layers and update thesecurity key. Therefore, the additional system overhead caused by theupdating of the primary component carrier can be reduced, and theproblem of lowered quality of service for the user due to the updatingof the primary component carrier can be avoided. In this situation, itis unnecessary to include all the related configuration information ofthe new primary component carrier in the RRC information body (forexample, not including the mobility control information), and it isnecessary to include only the configuration information that is updatedcompared with the old primary component carrier, i.e., the radioresource configuration information, which can be referred as incrementsignaling.

Ninth Embodiment

Obviously, the updating of all the primary component carriers can beperformed in the handover manner. However, not all the updating of theprimary component carriers can be performed in the reconfiguring manner.This is because that only if the new and old primary component carriershave the same security key and it is unnecessary to reconfigure the MAC,PDCP and RLC layers, it is possible to use the reconfiguring flow.

Therefore, the present application continues to propose that the flowfor updating is decided according to the updating scene. If the primarycomponent carriers before and after the updating belong to the same basestation, the primary component carrier is updated by using thereconfiguring flow. If the primary component carriers before and afterthe updating belong to the different base stations, the primarycomponent carrier is updated by using the handover flow.

Specifically, as shown in FIG. 17, the flow for updating the primarycomponent carrier includes: determining whether the new primarycomponent carrier and the old primary component carrier belong to thesame base station (step 1702); replacing the old primary componentcarrier with the new primary component carrier by this base station byusing the reconfiguring flow, if the new primary component carrier andthe old primary component carrier belong to the same base station (step1704); otherwise, transmitting a handover request to the base stationthe new primary component carrier belongs to by the base station the oldprimary component carrier belongs to, for acquiring the relatedinformation from the base station the new primary component carrierbelongs to (step 1704), and then replacing the old primary componentcarrier with the new primary component carrier by using the handoverflow (step 1706).

Specifically, in step 1704, the base station the old primary componentcarrier belongs to (referred as the old base station for shorthereinafter) transmits the handover request to the base station the newprimary component carrier belongs to (referred as the new base stationfor short hereinafter), so that the new base station can prepare theconfiguration information required for handover of the terminal to thenew primary component carrier, and thus the old base station can obtainthe necessary configuration information from the new base station, sothat the old base station can prepare during the handover flow the RRCreconfiguration information to be sent to the terminal.

The reconfiguring flow 1704 and the handover flow 1706 in thisembodiment are the same as those described in conjunction with FIG. 16and FIG. 18 hereinbefore. The slight difference is that since the newand old primary component carriers belong to different base stations,although the RRC reconfiguration information is still sent by the oldbase station, the random access process after the configuration iscompleted is the interaction with the new base station (which isdescribed in detail in conjunction with FIG. 31 hereinafter). Theresponse (or confirmation) message after the terminal completes theconfiguration is also sent to the new base station directly.

By comparing the eighth embodiment with the ninth embodiment, it can beseen that because it is necessary to reconfigure the MAC, PDCP, and RLClayers and update the security key during the handover process, thesystem overhead will be increased and the phenomenon of communicationinterrupt will occur inevitably. If the reconfiguring flow is adopted,the system overhead will be reduced significantly, and time length ofthe communication interrupt is decreased. Thus, the method proposed bythe ninth embodiment, in which whether the handover flow or thereconfiguring flow is used to update the primary component carrier isdetermined according to whether the primary component carriers beforeand after the updating belong to the same base station, can reduce theadditional system overhead due to the updating of the primary componentcarrier, and avoid the problems such as the degraded quality of servicefor the user due to the updating of the primary component carrier.

In the above reconfiguring flow, the new primary component carrier andthe old primary component carrier are generally within the samefrequency band, have the same time advance and both keep synchronouswith the base station. If such conditions are not satisfied, it isnecessary to initiate the random access of the new primary componentcarrier before the old primary component carrier is deactivated, asshown in FIG. 19.

Tenth Embodiment

In the eighth and ninth embodiments, the implicit premise is that thenew primary component carrier has been initially configured andactivated. However, in practice, there also exists the scene in whichthe new primary component carrier has not been initially configured, orhas been initially configured but not activated.

In this scene, no doubt, it is necessary to initially configure andactivate the carrier to be used as the new primary component carrierwhich has not been initially configured yet, and to activate the carrierto be used as the new primary component carrier which has been initiallyconfigured but not activated yet. The initial configuration (i.e., theadding of this carrier) should be performed at the beginning of thehandover flow or the reconfiguring flow (not shown in the Figures), butthe activation process is relatively flexible in terms of time order. Asshown in FIGS. 20 to 22 corresponding to FIGS. 16, 18 and 19, during theactivation process, the activating command can be sent by the basestation after the configuration is completed or after the random accessprocess, or before the old primary component carrier is deactivated (asshown in the Figures, the base station transmits the deactivatingcommand, but as described above, the deactivation process can also bethe implicit deactivating by the terminal itself). Alternatively, asshown in FIGS. 23 to 25 corresponding to FIGS. 16, 18 and 19, during theactivation process, the activating command can also be sent by the basestation before the RRC reconfiguration information is sent.

Further, the activating command can be combined or sent simultaneouslywith other commands. For example, if the new primary component carrieris in the status in which it is not initially configured, the initialconfiguration and activation processes can be combined to be defined asa new “configuring and activating” process to perform the configurationand activation simultaneously, that is, the base station transmits a“configuring and activating” command. The terminal performs theconfiguration and activation simultaneously after receiving thiscommand. Further, the activating command can be sent together with the“radio resource control” reconfiguration information.

In another embodiment, the initial configuring flow and the followinghandover flow or reconfiguring flow can be combined to be contained inone command to be performed, but not separated. That is, the initialconfiguring command can be combined with the RRC reconfigurationinformation.

Eleventh Embodiment

The updating of the secondary component carrier will be described in thefollowing. As described above, the updating of the secondary componentcarrier includes adding the selected new secondary component carrier, orreplacing a certain old secondary component carrier with the selectednew secondary component carrier. The latter situation is in fact thecombination of the adding action and the deleting action. Similar to theconsideration in the eighth embodiment, this embodiment proposes amethod for updating the secondary component carrier, for properlydetermining the opportunity for updating or adding the componentcarrier.

As shown in FIG. 26, the method of this embodiment includes thefollowing steps: acquiring the status information of the terminal, thebase station and/or the secondary component carrier (step 2202);determining whether the status information meets the predeterminedcondition (step 2204); and adding the new secondary component carrier orreplacing the old secondary component carrier with the new secondarycomponent carrier in the case that the status information meets thepredetermined condition (step 2206).

In the prior art, there exists various parameters for representing theterminal, the base station, and the performance and status of thecomponent carrier in use or the carrier that can be used by the basestation, and the like, and the related information can be obtained byvarious measurement or communication means. For such information,various predetermined conditions can be set depending on the requirementin the practical application, and the secondary component carrier willbe updated when the predetermined condition is satisfied.

As an illustrative example but not the restrictive enumeration, theconditions taken into consideration for updating the secondary componentcarrier can include at least one of the following:

1. More secondary component carriers are needed due to the requirementof service:

2. The terminal moves out of the coverage range of the old secondarycomponent carrier;

3. The signal quality of the old secondary component carrier isdegraded;

4. The physical resource amount for uplink and physical resource amountfor downlink of the old secondary component carrier is not enough;

5. The original base station requires to update the secondary componentcarrier considering problems such as the balance of the overall load ofthe network and the interference between the users: and

6. The terminal moves into the coverage range of the new base station.

The updating of the secondary component carrier can be implemented byusing the reconfiguring flow. This reconfiguring flow is similar to thereconfiguring flow for the primary component carrier described inconjunction with FIG. 18. The difference is that since the secondarycomponent carrier is not unique, the essence of the updating of thesecondary component carrier is to add the new secondary componentcarrier, as described above, and therefore, the reconfiguring flow forthe updating of the secondary component carrier does not need to includethe deactivating process.

Specifically, in the reconfiguring flow, the base station transmits“radio resource control (RRC)” reconfiguration information to theterminal. The “radio resource control” reconfiguration informationincludes only radio resource configuration information of the newsecondary component carrier. Then the terminal configures the newsecondary component carrier by using the radio resource configurationinformation of the new primary component carrier. Because it isunnecessary to reconfigure the MAC, PDCP and RLC layers or update thesecurity key, the additional system overhead caused by the updating ofthe secondary component carrier is reduced, and the problem of thedegraded quality of service for the user caused by the updating of thesecondary component carrier is avoided. In this situation, it isunnecessary to include all the related configuration information of thenew secondary component carrier in the RRC information body (forexample, not including the mobility control information), and it isnecessary to include only the radio resource configuration informationof the secondary component carrier, which is referred as incrementsignaling.

Likewise, similar to the tenth embodiment, in practice, there alsoexists the scene in which the new secondary component carrier has notbeen initially configured, or has been initially configured but notactivated.

In such a scene, it is also necessary to activate the carrier to be usedas the new secondary component carrier which has not been initiallyconfigured yet, or which has been initially configured but not activatedyet (FIGS. 27 and 28). For the secondary component carrier, when thereconfiguration in the present application is completed, the initialconfiguration thereof is completed (i.e., the adding of this carrier).The activation process is also relatively flexible in terms of timeorder. As shown in FIG. 28, during the activation process, theactivating command can be sent by the base station after theconfiguration based on the RRC reconfiguration information is completed.Alternatively, as shown in FIG. 27 during the activation process, theactivating command can also be sent by the base station before the RRCreconfiguration information is sent.

Likewise, the activating command can be combined or sent simultaneouslywith other commands. For example, the activating command can be senttogether with the “radio resource control” reconfiguration information.

Twelfth Embodiment

The method for updating the component carrier described in the eighth totenth embodiments can be performed by the base station and the terminalin cooperation in the communication system.

Therefore, in this embodiment, there is proposed a terminal, a basestation and a communication system that are respectively able toimplement the above embodiments.

In the description of the terminal, the base station and thecommunication system in this embodiment and the following embodiments,unless necessary, the detailed description of the various embodimentsthat have been described above will not be repeated any more, andreference can be made to the description of the various embodimentsdescribed above.

As shown in FIG. 29, a base station 2420 communicates with a terminal2520 in a carrier aggregating communication network, and performs theupdating of the primary component carrier. Specifically, the terminalincludes: a status acquiring unit 2402 for acquiring the statusinformation of the terminal, the base station and/or the primarycomponent carrier; a status determining unit 2404 for determiningwhether the status information meets the predetermined condition; and aprimary component carrier updating unit 2406 for replacing the oldprimary component carrier with the new primary component carrier in thecase that the status information meets the predetermined condition.

Specifically, the status acquiring unit 2402 is used for acquiring theinformation based on which the status determining unit 2404 candetermine whether the updating condition of the primary componentcarrier is satisfied. What information is to be obtained is dependent onthe updating condition, and the updating condition in turn can beoptionally set according to the specific application.

For example, the predetermined condition includes at least one of thefollowing:

1. The terminal moves out of the coverage range of the old primarycomponent carrier;

2. The signal quality of the old primary component carrier is degraded;

3. The physical resource amount for uplink and physical resource amountfor downlink of the old primary component carrier is not enough;

4. The original base station requires to update the primary componentcarrier considering problems such as the balance of the overall load ofthe network and the interference between the users; and

5. The terminal moves into the coverage range of the new base station.

Then, for the conditions 1 and 5, the judgment must be made based on theposition of the terminal and the coverage range of the primary componentcarrier of the corresponding base station. For the condition 2, it isnecessary to acquire the signal quality information from the terminal.For the condition 3, it is necessary to acquire the related informationfrom the base station. The condition 4 is completely a command from thebase station.

Therefore, depending on what the predetermined condition specificallyis, the status acquiring unit 2402 may only need to acquire the relatedinformation form the base station itself but not to interact with theterminal 2520, and may also need to interact with the terminal 2520 toacquire the related information. The specific manner for acquiring theinformation has been described in the description given with respect tothe selecting of the component carrier, which will not be repeated anymore here.

The primary component carrier updating unit 2406 interacts with theterminal 2502, so as to perform the updating of the primary componentcarrier. As described above, all the updating of the primary componentcarriers can be performed by the handover flow. Therefore, in anembodiment, as shown in FIG. 30, the primary component carrier updatingunit 2406 can include: a reconfiguration information transmitting unit24062 for transmitting the “radio resource control” reconfigurationinformation to the terminal, the “radio resource control”reconfiguration information including the mobility control informationwhich includes the information used by the terminal to reconfigure theMAC, PDCP and RLC layers and update the security key, and the radioresource configuration information used by the terminal to configure thenew primary component carrier; and a random access unit 24064 forinitiating the non-competitive random access or responding to the randomaccess request from the terminal.

As described above, the handover flow includes the deactivating of theold primary component carrier. However, the deactivating command can besent by the base station, or the implicit deactivating can also beperformed by the terminal itself. In the former manner, the primarycomponent carrier updating unit 2406 can further include a deactivatingcommand transmitting unit 24066, for deactivating the old primarycomponent carrier, as shown in FIG. 30. However, in the latter manner,the primary component carrier updating unit 2406 may not include thedeactivating command transmitting unit 24066.

Correspondingly, this embodiment further provides a correspondingterminal 2520 as shown in FIG. 30, and the terminal 2520 includes: areconfiguration information receiving unit 2502 for receiving the “radioresource control” reconfiguration information from the base station; amobility control configuring unit 2504 for reconfiguring the MAC. PDCPand RLC layers and updating the security key according to the “radioresource control” reconfiguration information; a radio resourceconfiguring unit 2506 for configuring the new primary component carrieraccording to the radio resource configuration information contained inthe “radio resource control” reconfiguration information; a randomaccess unit 2510 for initiating the competitive random access orresponding to the non-competitive random access initiated by the basestation; and a deactivating unit 2508 for deactivating the old primarycomponent carrier in accordance with the presetting or according to thedeactivating command sent by the base station.

The above base station 2420 and terminal 2520 are adapted for performingthe handover flow. Naturally, when the reconfiguring flow describedabove is completed, the “radio resource control” reconfigurationinformation which the reconfiguration information transmitting unit24062 is configured to transmit to the terminal includes only the radioresource configuration information of the new primary component carrier,for configuring the new primary component carrier by the terminal 2520.Correspondingly, no function of the mobility control configuring unit2504 is needed in the terminal 2520.

As described above, the reconfiguring flow generally has no randomaccess process, and thus the above base station 2420 and terminal 2520adapted for performing the reconfiguring flow both can have no randomaccess unit. However, as described above, the base station 2420 and theterminal 2520 can also respectively contain the corresponding randomaccess unit, so as to randomly access the new primary component carrierbefore the old primary component carrier is deactivated in the case thatthe new and old primary component carriers do not satisfy the followingconditions. Such conditions are that the new and old primary componentcarriers are within the same frequency band, have the same time advanceand both keep synchronous with the base station.

As described above, for the updating of the primary component carrier,the preferred manner is to properly select the handover flow or thereconfiguring flow depending on the application scene, and thus it isbetter for the base station and the terminal to each have the ability ofprocessing the handover flow and the reconfiguring flow. For theterminal 2520, it can be seen from the above description that all theillustrated components of the terminal 2520 shown in FIG. 30 will beused in the handover flow, and only part of the components will be usedin the reconfiguring flow. Therefore, it is believed that the terminalbeing able to perform the handover flow can also perform thereconfiguring flow.

However, the RRC reconfiguration information is transmitted by the basestation, thus whether to use the handover flow or the reconfiguring flowis to be determined by the base station. Therefore, as shown in FIG. 31,in the base station 2420 that supports both the handover flow and thereconfiguring flow, the status determining unit 2404 can be furtherconfigured to judge whether the new and old primary component carriersbelong to the same base station based on the information obtained by thestatus acquiring unit 2402. Of course, such judgment can also be made byany component in the base station 2420, and the result is notified tothe primary component carrier updating unit 2406. Generally, forexample, the base station itself knows the current primary componentcarrier of the terminal. However, during the selecting of the primarycomponent carrier, the new primary component carrier is determined bythe base station, or determined by the terminal and notified to the basestation (for example, transmitting the request for updating the primarycomponent carrier to the base station), and thus the base station canjudge whether the new and old primary component carriers belong the samebase station based on the above information. Because the terminal mustrequest the base station which the terminal currently belongs to (i.e.,the base station the old primary component carrier belongs to) forupdating the primary component carrier, the above judgment of the basestation is to judge whether the new primary component carrier is acarrier of the base station itself.

Correspondingly, the reconfiguration information transmitting unit 24062can be configured to transmit different configuration information indifferent cases. That is, in the case that the new and old primarycomponent carriers belong to the same base station, the “radio resourcecontrol” reconfiguration information transmitted to the terminalincludes only the radio resource configuration information of the newprimary component carrier, for configuring the new primary componentcarrier by the terminal; in the case that the new and old primarycomponent carriers belong to different base stations, the “radioresource control” reconfiguration information includes the mobilitycontrol information which includes the information for reconfiguring theMAC, PDCP and RLC layers and updating the security key by the terminal,and the radio resource configuration information for configuring the newprimary component carrier by the terminal.

Further, in the case that the new and old primary component carriersbelong to different base stations and the handover flow is used, asdescribed above, the random access unit 2510 of the terminal 2520 willinteract with the random access unit 24064′ of the new base station2420′, but not interact with the random access unit 24064 of the oldbase station 2420, as shown in FIG. 31. In this case, the random accessunit 24064′ of the new base station 2420′ and the random access unit24064 of the old base station 2420 can be the same component, but belongto different base station entities; but they can also be differentcomponents, and even the old base station 2420 is not necessarily thesame as the new base station 2420′. However, in the ideal conditions,the old base station 2420 and the new base station 2420′ should have thesame structure, and only part of the components of the new base station2420′ is illustrated in FIG. 31 for conciseness. The deactivating unitmentioned hereinafter is similar to this.

If the terminal does not deactivate the old primary component carrier inthe implicit manner, then the base station needs to use the deactivatingcommand transmitting unit. Similar to the random access unit, in thecase that the new and old primary component carriers belong to differentbase stations and the handover flow is used, the deactivating commandshould be transmitted by the new base station 2420′, that is, thedeactivating command transmitting unit 24066′ of the new base station2420′ interacts with the deactivating unit 2508 of the terminal 2520, asshown in FIG. 31.

Further, in the case that the new and old primary component carriersbelong to different base stations and the handover flow is used, sincedifferent base stations are involved, and association between differentbase stations is also involved. Therefore, the base station can furtherinclude a switch requesting unit 3102 for transmitting a handoverrequest to the base station the new primary component carrier belongs toin the case that the new and old primary component carriers belong todifferent base stations, acquiring the related information from the basestation the new primary component carrier belongs to, so as to prepareby the reconfiguration information transmitting unit the RRCreconfiguration information to be transmitted to the terminal. Thedetails have been described in the method embodiments, which will not berepeated any more here.

Further, the primary component carrier updating unit can further includean activating command transmitting unit (not shown in the Figures), fortransmitting the activating command before or while the reconfigurationinformation transmitting unit transmits the “radio resource control”reconfiguration information or after the terminal performs theconfiguration by using the “radio resource control” reconfigurationinformation, so as to activate the new primary component carrier, in thecase that the new primary component carrier has not been initiallyconfigured or activated. Further, the base station can further includean initial configuring unit (not shown in the Figures), for transmittingto the terminal a command for initially configuring (adding) the primarycomponent carrier, in the case that the new primary component carrierhas not be configured initially.

Correspondingly, the terminal can further include a primary componentcarrier activating unit (not shown in the Figures) for receiving theactivating command transmitted by the base station and activating thenew primary component carrier. The terminal can further include aninitial configuring unit (not shown in the Figures) for adding theprimary component carrier in response to the command from the basestation.

Naturally, as shown in FIGS. 29, 30 and 31, the above descriptionfurther discloses a communication system consisting of the variousembodiments of the above terminal and the various embodiments of theabove base station.

Thirteenth Embodiment

The method described in the eleventh embodiment is performed by the basestation and the terminal in cooperation in the communication system.

Therefore, in this embodiment, there is proposed a terminal, a basestation and a communication system that are respectively able toimplement the above embodiments.

In the description of the terminal, the base station and thecommunication system in this embodiment and the following embodiments,unless necessary, the detailed description of the various embodimentsthat have been described above will not be repeated any more, andreference can be made to the description of the various embodimentsdescribed above.

As shown in FIG. 32, a base station 3000 communicates with a terminal3020 in a carrier aggregating communication network, and performs theupdating of the secondary component carrier. Specifically, the terminalincludes: a status acquiring unit 3002 for acquiring the statusinformation of the terminal, the base station and/or the secondarycomponent carrier; a status determining unit 3004 for determiningwhether the status information meets the predetermined condition; and asecondary component carrier updating unit 3006 for adding the newsecondary component carrier or replacing the old secondary componentcarrier with the new secondary component carrier in the case that thestatus information meets the predetermined condition.

Specifically, the status acquiring unit 3002 is used for acquiring theinformation based on which the status determining unit 3004 candetermine whether the updating condition of the secondary componentcarrier is satisfied. What information is to be obtained is dependent onthe updating condition, and the updating condition in turn can beoptionally set according to the specific application.

For example, the predetermined condition includes at least one of thefollowing:

1. More secondary component carriers are needed due to the requirementof service;

2. The terminal moves out of the coverage range of the old secondarycomponent carrier;

3. The signal quality of the old secondary component carrier isdegraded;

4. The physical resource amount for uplink and physical resource amountfor downlink of the old secondary component carrier is not enough;

5. The original base station requires to update the secondary componentcarrier considering the problems such as the balance of the overall loadof the network and the interference between the users; and

6. The terminal moves into the coverage range of the new base station

Then, for the conditions 2 and 6, the judgment must be made based on theposition of the terminal and the coverage range of the primary componentcarrier of the corresponding base station. For the condition 3, it isnecessary to acquire the signal quality information from the terminal.For the condition 4, it is necessary to acquire the related informationfrom the base station. The conditions 1 and 5 are completely a commandfrom the base station.

Therefore, depending on what the predetermined condition specificallyis, the status acquiring unit 3002 may only need to acquire the relatedinformation form the base station itself but not to interact with theterminal 3020, but it may also need to interact with the terminal 3020to acquire the related information. The specific manner for acquiringthe information has been described in the description given with respectto the selecting of the component carrier, which will not be repeatedany more here.

The secondary component carrier updating unit 3006 interacts with theterminal 3002, so as to perform the updating of the secondary componentcarrier. In an embodiment, as shown in FIG. 33, the secondary componentcarrier updating unit 3006 can include: a reconfiguration informationtransmitting unit 30062 for transmitting the “radio resource control”reconfiguration information to the terminal, the “radio resourcecontrol” reconfiguration information including only the radio resourceconfiguration information of the new secondary component carrier, forconfiguring the new secondary component carrier by the terminal.

Correspondingly, this embodiment further provides a correspondingterminal 3020 as shown in FIG. 33, and the terminal 3020 includes: areconfiguration information receiving unit 3022 for receiving the “radioresource control” reconfiguration information from the base station; anda radio resource configuring unit 3024 for configuring the new secondarycomponent carrier according to the radio resource configurationinformation contained in the “radio resource control” reconfigurationinformation.

Further, the secondary component carrier updating unit 3006 can furtherinclude a activating command transmitting unit 30066, for transmittingthe activating command after the new secondary component carrier isadded or the old secondary component carrier is replaced with the newsecondary component carrier, so as to activate the new secondarycomponent carrier; alternatively, for transmitting the activatingcommand before or while the reconfiguration information transmittingunit transmits the “radio resource control” reconfiguration information,so as to activate the new secondary component carrier, in the case thatthe new secondary component carrier has not been initially configured oractivated.

Correspondingly, the terminal can further include a secondary componentcarrier activating unit 3028 for receiving the activating commandtransmitted by the base station and activating the new secondarycomponent carrier.

Naturally, as shown in FIGS. 32 and 33, the above description furtherdiscloses a communication system consisting of the various embodimentsof the above terminal and the various embodiments of the above basestation.

Some of the embodiments of the present application have been describedin detail in the above. As can be understood by those skilled in theart, all or any step or component of the method and the apparatus of thepresent invention can be implemented by hardware, firmware, software orthe combination thereof in any computing device (including thecommunication device) including processor, storage medium or the like orthe network (including the communication network) of the computingdevice, which can be implemented by those skilled in the art by usingtheir basic programming skill with the knowledge of the content of thepresent invention, and thus will not be explained in detail here.

Further, it is obvious that when possible external operations areinvolved in the above description, it is evidently necessary to use anydisplay device and nay inputting device connected to any computingdevice and the corresponding interface and controlling program. To sum,the related hardware, software in the computer, computer system orcomputer network and the hardware, firmware, software or the combinationthereof for implementing the above method of the present inventionconsist the device and the component thereof in the present invention.

Therefore, based on the above understanding, the object of the presentinvention can also be achieved by executing one program or a group ofprograms on any information processing device. The informationprocessing device can be the well-known universal device. Thus, theobject of the present invention can also be achieved by only providingthe program product containing the program code for implementing themethod or device. That is, such program product also constitutes thepresent invention, and the storage medium storing such program productalso constitutes the present invention. Obviously, the storage mediumcan be any type of storage medium that is already known to those skilledin the art or that will be developed in future, including but notlimited to floppy disk, optical disk, magnetic optical disk, memorycard, memory stick or the like.

In the device and method of the present invention, it is obvious thatvarious components or various steps can be divided, combined and/ordivided and then recombined. Those division and/or recombination shouldbe considered as the equivalent solution of the present invention.

It is to be further noted that the steps for performing the above seriesof processing can be performed chronologically according to the sequenceof the description, but are unnecessarily performed in series in timeorder. Some steps can be performed in parallel or individually.

Further, although the above description is given one embodiment by oneembodiment, it is to be understood that the various embodiments are notisolated. Obviously, those skilled in the art can understand that thevarious technical features contained in various embodiments can becombined optionally among various embodiments, as long as they do notconflict with each other. Evidently, all the technical featuresmentioned in the same embodiment can also be optionally combined, aslong as they do not conflict with each other.

Finally, the terms “include”, “comprise”, “contain” or any othervariation is intended to cover the non-exclusive inclusion, so that aprocess, method, article or device that includes a series of elementsinclude not only those elements but also other elements not explicitlylisted, or further include inherent elements of such process, method,article or device. In addition, in the case of no more limitations, anelement defined by the sentence “comprise a” does not exclude thepresence of other same elements in the process, method, article ordevice that includes an element.

Although the embodiments and the advantages thereof have been describedin conjunction with the accompanying drawings, it should be understoodthat the embodiments described above are only for the purpose ofillustration, but not to limit the present invention. Variousmodifications and variations can be made by those skilled in the artwithout departing from the substance and scope of the present invention.Therefore, the scope of the present invention is only defined by theappended claims and their equivalents, and various variations,substitutions and changes can be made without departing from the spiritand scope of the present invention defined by the appended claims.

What is claimed is:
 1. A electronic device, comprising processingcircuitry configured to, enable a random access procedure on a componentcarrier for a user equipment; conduct a secondary component carrierselection for the user equipment based on a coverage distribution andsignal quality of different available carriers; and generate for theuser equipment a radio resource control reconfiguration informationcomprising radio resource configuration information of one or moresecondary component carriers selected through the secondary componentcarrier selection, wherein the component carrier is designated as aprimary component carrier of the user equipment, and the primarycomponent carrier and one or more secondary component carriers supportcommunications with the user equipment in a carrier aggregationcommunication scheme.
 2. The electronic device according to claim 1,further comprising a communication unit, configured to transmit anactivation command to the user equipment to activate one or moresecondary component carriers.
 3. The electronic device according toclaim 1, further comprising a communication unit, configured to receivea handover request from a source base station serving the user equipmentwith an old primary component carrier, and determine to enable therandom access procedure.
 4. The electronic device according to claim 1,wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to conduct thesecondary component carrier selection based on at least one of thefollowing factors: physical resource amount for uplink, physicalresource amount for downlink, interference magnitude and loadconditions.
 5. The electronic device according to claim 1, wherein, toconduct the secondary component carrier selection, the processingcircuitry is further configured to determine the coverage distributionof different available carriers corresponding to a predetermineddistribution mode, and select one or more secondary component carriersbased on a selection rule of the predetermined distribution mode.
 6. Theelectronic device according to claim 5, wherein the predetermineddistribution mode is that coverage ranges of different availablecarriers are substantially the same, and the selection rule comprisestaking each available carrier as a candidate component carrier.
 7. Theelectronic device according to claim 5, wherein the predetermineddistribution mode is that there exist at least two available carrierscoverage ranges of which are substantially not coincident with eachother nor contained one in the other but overlapped with each other; andthe selection rule comprises determining a candidate component carrierbased on a position of the user equipment.
 8. The electronic deviceaccording to claim 5, wherein the predetermined distribution mode isthat there exists at least one available carrier coverage range of whichis substantially contained within coverage range of at least one otheravailable carrier; and the selection rule comprises determining acandidate component carrier based on the size of the coverage range ofeach available carrier.
 9. The electronic device according to claim 1,wherein the processing circuitry is configured to conduct the secondarycomponent carrier selection if secondary component carrier is requiredfor a communication service of the user equipment.
 10. The electronicdevice according to claim 1, wherein the processing circuitry is furtherconfigured to conduct the secondary component carrier selection based onPDCCII condition of each available carrier.
 11. The electronic deviceaccording to claim 1, wherein the processing circuitry is furtherconfigured to initiate the random access procedure and enable the randomaccess procedure as a non-contention based random access procedure. 12.The electronic device according to claim 1, wherein the processingcircuitry is further configured to determine whether a selectedsecondary component carrier is for replacing an old secondary componentcarrier of the user equipment, and if yes, generate the radio resourcecontrol reconfiguration information comprising both of the commands ofadding the selected secondary component carrier and removing the oldsecondary component carrier.
 13. The electronic device according toclaim 1, wherein the electronic device is a base station.
 14. A methodfor supporting a carrier aggregation communication scheme, comprisingenabling a random access procedure on a component carrier for a userequipment; conducting a secondary component carrier selection for theuser equipment based on a coverage distribution and signal quality ofdifferent available carriers; and generating for the user equipment aradio resource control reconfiguration information comprising radioresource configuration information of one or more secondary componentcarriers selected through the secondary component carrier selection,wherein the component carrier is designated as a primary componentcarrier of the user equipment, and the primary component carrier and oneor more secondary component carriers support communications with theuser equipment in the carrier aggregation communication scheme.
 15. Anon-transitory computer storage medium that contains computer readableinstructions that when executed by a processor performs a method forsupporting a carrier aggregation communication scheme, the methodcomprising: enabling a random access procedure on a component carrierfor a user equipment; conducting a secondary component carrier selectionfor the user equipment based on a coverage distribution and signalquality of different available carriers; and generating for the userequipment a radio resource control reconfiguration informationcomprising radio resource configuration information of one or moresecondary component carriers selected through the secondary componentcarrier selection, wherein the component carrier is designated as aprimary component carrier of the user equipment, and the primarycomponent carrier and one or more secondary component carriers supportcommunications with the user equipment in the carrier aggregationcommunication scheme.